What have I lost in the process ...........

[Ice House]

I have been thinking about this quite a bit lately. This has been a topic or theme of integration.

I was reading a thread this evening and I was going to reply to a post and I thought I wanted to start a new topic on this.

And what was lifestyle like previous to DMT?

I dont know the answer to this. I dont recall or remember how I percieved things before DMT. Everything has this different twist to it now. My normal mentations I believe are very different than they were pre DMT.

Hmm I actually have though about this quite a bit. I know I have gained soo much. So much has been opened up to me, but... . . . . . . . .. .

I dont think I'd change a thing. However......

I have lost quite a bit also. We all have.

I have no remorse. Sometimes I wonder, what was it like.

How would my life be different now if I had never done DMT.

I believe it would be very different.

I'm just curious as to what some of the other thoughts on this are.

anyone?

 

[KwisatzHaderach]

I too have been contemplating this topic, but I think in another way.

Imagine yourself as a reptile. Eventually you will outgrown your skin and shed it. Though there is a symbolic sense of death, as the old skin is lost, but there is also a symbolic sense of life as a new, tougher skin is there.

Change is a constant so do not think of lives previous to DMT as lost, but accept what you have become because of the paths the spice may have opened in you.

Nothing is lost and everything is going the right way.

thankyou

 

[WSaged]

I tend to think of it as growing...not changing.
I've always been who I've been, as long as I can remember (back to about 6 yrs old...) same me, Just more experienced.
And maybe a bit taller.


WS

 

[ms_manic_minxx]

I've lost my power to disassociate, to deceive, and to do harm. I speak up for myself, finally (not keeping things inside).

I may have been swallowed by the dark side. :shock:

 

[Ice House]

Imagine yourself as a reptile. Eventually you will outgrown your skin and shed it. Though there is a symbolic sense of death, as the old skin is lost, but there is also a symbolic sense of life as a new, tougher skin is there.

thankyou

I like this analogy.
This path in life I walk is a fullfilling one. It wouldnt be as wonderful as it is if it wasnt for my perspective on life.

Thinking about this a little further last night I realized that there are many events or milestones that have happened throught my 46 years of existence that have changed the way I see things forever and really DMT though very unique is just one of several things that have changed my outlook or perspective on life.

Some of the others that have had just as big an impact on changing the way I experience life-

Puberty/Losing my virginity
Marriage and divorce
Parenthood
17 years in the Marines/Combat time
Drug addiction/sobriety

I dont know that DMT has been any more important in how it has changed me as a person as any of the above listed events. I think that it is just more prominent now because its a force in my life now.

 

[azrael]

at first I was going to ask 'why not all psychedelics...' but after a moment dmt kind of separated it self in my life's experiences too.

basically dmt got me off some paths and onto others. I like to think that this was a decision after carefully weighing everything out with the assistance of dmt and that the paths I got on have more benefits than deficits.

one thing that stands out for me personally was the decline of my ability to relate to regular people. I thought I could relate more, but it was really a greater understanding of myself that made me more comfortable in my own skin and able to interact rather than the empathic understanding that I thought it was. This is totally just me and how I went from extrovert to introvert to expressed introvert to what's going on now.

reptile shedding, journey of self discovery, life... overall dmt has been a positive influence on my life both when I'm smoking it and the time between.

 

[clouds]

I've lost my power to disassociate, to deceive, and to do harm.

You've lost the capacity to do harm? Really?

 

[OpeningPandorasBox]

one thing that stands out for me personally was the decline of my ability to relate to regular people.

Completely agree.

I never realized how artificially structured our lives really are. I feel like others know very little about their own consciousness. The best way to understand your own consciousness is to alter it.

 

[Ac30f5pade5]

I actually noticed this after my first drug experience ever, which was MDMA. I realized it looking back a long time after the experience. I became a lot more aware of myself and my thought processes after that first time. I never paid attention on my perceptions before I started indulging in psychedelics.

I'm really excited to see what life to me is post-DMT.

I tend to think of it as growing...not changing.

I personally think they're interdependent, ie. change represents growth or vice versa.

Edit: Interdependent as is everything else in life.

one thing that stands out for me personally was the decline of my ability to relate to regular people.

Completely agree.

Same here, but we're all "regular people," no?

 

[Morphane]

I think this can be applied to any life changing event. Imagining what you were like before a loved one died for example, or what was life like before sexuality invaded my consciousness, etc.

I've come to realise that I'm really unchanged. There is this core person, a child, underneath all my various neuroses and cultural programming, religious brainwashing, and such. He is exactly the same, though he's been taken on a pretty far out ride. So nothing is lost, it is brought along.

I share with what WSaged said.

 

[Caen]

Good question.
What is the altered lifestyle?

Never being able to contemplate what was brought up during the psychedelic revelations.
Seeing things the way you see them the way you are seeing them.
Not hearing any mind altered sounds, only hearing what comes in.
Lack of the imaginary thought process that occurs when on mind altering substances.
Minus the sense of beauty of the world as it was perceived while on the journeys.

... Then leading life as it goes on.
Deep down, you are still whom you are.
One breath away from life and death.
The sun rises and the moon waits.

Just walking life baring the gifts the moments have brought on.
Maybe it would have been different.
Maybe not.

Still spice flows while in some places to be thought.

 

[BananaForeskin]

This is a very good question, and one I have contemplated much of late (as I'm taking a break from the chaoses of both work and psychedelics). One year ago, two years ago, I still thought stuff like mushrooms, any drugs stronger than pot really, would melt your brain.

Now I feel like ten times a different person, but I know I'm not; much in my life remains the same..... need to think about this one more...

 

[WSaged]

I've come to realise that I'm really unchanged. There is this core person, a child, underneath all my various neuroses and cultural programming, religious brainwashing, and such. He is exactly the same, though he's been taken on a pretty far out ride. So nothing is lost, it is brought along.

Exactly what I meant!! worded better though!


I was trying to explain this to a friend the other day, how if you think back to when you were 6-7 yrs old, & try to remember the thought processes that where passing through your mind during certain memories. There aren't really many difference compared to your thought processes today! Now of coarse you have years of programing & experiences to pepper how your thought processes go about making conclusions & decisions, but that core voice...the "inner monologue"...the being in this body, having these thoughts...(at least for me) is exactly the same!

I can remember playing in the back yard of the house I moved out of when I was 8 & thinking about digging a hole up through an old, dead, decaying tree.
Gross right? but I didn't know that yet...
I remember the process of sizing it up & deciding how to get started, freaking out when I got stuck in there covered with spiders & dead tree, etc...
It was the same voice I hear now in my head, just less experienced through life & less filters had been collected.

Makes me look at old people very differently & hope I can remember this when my body starts to get old & close to its end!!

So nothing is lost, it is brought along.

LOVE THAT!!!



WS